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Sadbhawna Today

Sadbhawna Today

Friday, October 22, 2010

Bihar polls: Nitish, Modi, Lalu seeking votes for criminals

For a state seeking to erase the taint of corruption and lawlessness, this sure is a step backwards. As top politicians campaigning for candidates with criminal records. The criminal and financial background of the candidates who will contest phase 2 and phase 3 of the poll is revealed. It may be taken that the same pattern would have been repeated for the candidates of phase 1.

All the major political parties have given tickets to contest on their respective symbols to these aspirants with pending criminal cases. 71 per cent of the LJP, 69 per cent of the BJP, 66 percent of the JD(U), 63 per cent of the RJD, 38 per cent of the BSP and 31 per cent of INC candidates have self confessed criminal backgrounds and face pending criminal cases. 272 candidates, 54 per cent, have not declared their PAN card details. Under electoral law they should be debarred from contesting the poll. Nothing of the sort will happen of course.

Against only 36 multi-millionaires in the last assembly elections, there are over 100 multi-millionaires in the second and third phases of the ongoing Bihar polls, a report by two NGOs has said. It adds that 219 candidates have criminal records. Out Of 219 candidates, 129 face serious criminal charges like murder and attempt to murder. The Association of Democratic Reforms and the National Election Watch said that 104 candidates contesting for the second and third phases on Oct 24 and Oct 28 were multi-millionaires. The 2,032 candidates contesting for the 140 seats in the first three rounds, 72 have proven records of criminal cases, including murder. The report was compiled after analysing 503 affidavits of candidates contesting for the second and third phases in Bihar polls.

It is true that these self confessed criminals are contesting the polls under different party symbols. But the differences among them are at best symbolic.The respective party affiliations are symbolic. The common purpose of the Criminal Party is substantive. Recall the corruption spread across different parties being exposed in the CWG probe. Much more may be revealed with passage of time. It does not matter who will become the CM of Bihar. It will not matter in the future who will become PM of India. The agenda will be set by the Criminal Party. No PM or CM will dare deviate from its agenda. This is the bald truth. Indians must learn to live with this truth. FYI, Living in self delusion invites the slow but inevitable death of democracy in India.